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Welcome
This newsletter from the Office of Technology Commercialization and Ventures (formerly the Office of Commercial Venture and Intellectual Property) at the President's Office of the University of Massachusetts is designed to keep you informed of the latest technology activities and successes relating to technology commercialization occurring at the President's Office and on the five campuses. |
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Active Fourth Quarter for Disclosures
The University had a strong quarter in terms of faculty disclosures. Licensing income was $1.4M, mainly from Mass Biologics with smaller contributions from the Lowell, Amherst, and Worcester campuses.
The primary sources of licensing income for the quarter were Felsuma, Anellotech and ACT for UMass Amherst (all previous startups); Infineum and Anterios (another startup) for Lowell; and Grifols, Inc. (MBL), Sunovion, Carnegie Institute of Technology and from the Shriver Institute for UMass Worcester.
For the quarter, Amherst executed 1 exclusive and 3 non-exclusive licenses, and Worcester executed 1 exclusive license and 2 non-exclusive licenses. No licenses were completed from the other 3 campuses; however UMass Lowell completed 4 exclusive option agreements which can prepare the way for future licenses.
Licensing Activities
Amherst completed 1 exclusive license to Alphabet Energy, a CA based manufacturer of generators, for silicon based material invented by
 | | Thomas Russell, Ph.D. |
Professor Thomas Russell and 3 non-exclusive licenses for the CIDSM (Center for International Securities and Derivatives Markets) database. Worcester completed 1 exclusive license with Grifols for the monoclonal antibody against rabies developed by the UMass Biolab. The license field is limited to North America. Two non-exclusive licenses were completed for a transgenic mouse and for several hybridomas. An option for hyper-spectral imaging technology developed by Professor Michael Chin, Radiation Oncology was
 | | Sanjeev Manohar, Ph.D. |
also completed with HyperMed. Lowell completed 5 option agreements with Triton Systems Inc. for a series of optical and chemical detection methods developed by Sanjeev Manohar in the Department of Chemical Engineering to identify food-borne toxins such as the naturally occurring products cyanide and arsenic, and synthetically produced contaminants such as methamidophos, an organophosphate insecticide commonly used in mass agriculture of potato and rice crops, and polyethylene terephthalate (PET), a polyester byproduct found in soil resulting from the decomposition of packaging. Triton was the sponsor.
Six UMass Start-up Companies in FY14 - the Most in UMass History
No new start-ups were reported for the 4th quarter. However, it is worth noting that for the year UMass had 6 newcos, the most recorded in one year since this office was formed. The companies were Aha! Productions/Innovation Accelerator based on "Obscure Features
 | | Phillip Zamore, Ph.D. |
Hypothesis" by Joseph McCaffrey from UMass Amherst; Sonation based on "Expert System for Musical Accompaniment" by Chris Raphael from UMass Amherst; TATT, LLC based on "Use of siRNA to Preserve Organs for Transplant" by Timothy Kowalik and Marc Uknis from UMass Worcester; Agalimmune Ltd based on "Cancer Immunotherapy" by Uri Galili from UMass Worcester; Felsuma based on "Geckskin-adhesive Technology" by Al Crosby and Duncan Irshick at UMass Amherst; and Voyager Therapeutics based on "RNA Interference" by Phil Zamore, Guangping Gao, Neil Aronin and others at UMass Worcester.
UMass Investment Fund Activity
There were no new investments made this quarter. By way of an update, Felsuma which was approved for a $200K investment subject to raising $2M, raised $1.2M to date. We have limited our investment to $100K until the additional funding is raised. However the company has reached a significant milestone demonstrating its ability to manufacture a "Geckskin" product. In addition, a University Technology Advisory Committee was recently formed consisting of 3 external experts who were UMass Amherst alum Vivek Soni and MA Clean Energy Center's investment manager Tibor Toth to review a proposal for an investment in Qteros, based on technology developed by the lab of Professor Susan Leschine at UMass Amherst. The review included a presentation by its CEO Steve Rogers and its CTO Judith Giordan and written material. The Committee's recommendation was not to invest at this time and no further action will be taken.
Potential investments in two new companies, Cyna Therapeutic and Sonation, both out of UMass Amherst, are being explored. Cyna is at an early stage and the Sonation opportunity will be reviewed next month. Any campus which has an investment opportunity in a start-up, even at an early stage, should contact Bill Rosenberg.
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UMass Entrepreneurship Activity
June 16 Retreat on Entrepreneurship and Follow-up
A very successful University Retreat on Entrepreneurship was hosted on June 16 at the offices of Fish and Richardson by Bill Rosenberg and Abi
 | | UMass President Bob Caret |
Barrow in partnership with the UMass Commons Working Group. It was the University's first ever retreat covering entrepreneurship with participation of the President's Office and all 5 campuses. There were more than 70 attendees from a variety of supporting programs including OTCV, research administration, business schools and others. The keynote speakers
 | | MA Secretary of Housing and Economic Development, Gregory Bialecki |
were President Bob Caret and MA Secretary of Housing and
Economic Development Gregory Bialecki. Presentations
by each campus on their efforts to foster entrepreneurship were given, and a panel was held on teaching entrepreneurship. On the panel were former UMass President Jack Wilson, Vice Provost Mark Rice from WPI and Professor Bill Wooldridge from the Isenberg School. The moderator was James Barlow, Director of Tufts' Entrepreneurial Leadership Program. The Retreat also featured 4 simultaneous breakout sessions on Mentoring, Entrepreneurs in Residence, Competitions and Education.
A meeting of the UMass Commons Working Group met in early August to review the recommendations of the Retreat breakout sessions and prioritize their recommendations. Members of each of the 5 campuses and the President's Office attended. Recommendations were to market and celebrate the campus competitions as a group; define the role of EIRs and recruitment assistance; assistance with defining the mentor role and recruitment; and forming a separate academic group to make recommendations regarding entrepreneurial education. A Working Group meeting will be held in the fall to plan for their implementation.
First-Ever Event for Alumni Entrepreneurs
A group of UMass alumni entrepreneurs and colleagues at Economic Development (Doug Banks, OTCV and MTTC) organized and hosted an event to highlight the growing array of entrepreneurial activity at UMass and help our entrepreneurs connect with each other and with resource people (e.g., marketing, legal). Some 50 people participated in last week's event which was held at MassChallenge, located in Boston's Innovation District. We anticipate more such events in the future.
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Mass Technology Transfer Center (MTTC) Programming, Grant Awards and Policy Activities
The MTTC, under Abi Barrow's leadership as Founding Director, has continued its work in organizing technology transfer events and programs across the Commonwealth that showcase the work of UMass faculty and that of other inventors across the state. The  MTTC also supports faculty entrepreneurs through its "Platform" program and assists faculty to demonstrate the feasibility of their technology through "proof of concept" grants.
"Proof of Concept" Legislation
On July 31st, the House and the Senate passed Bill H.4377 188th (Current). An Act promoting economic growth across the Commonwealth. The bill includes funding of $2M with a minimum of half reserved for UMass. The President's Office staff worked closely with Chris Dunn in Government Relations at UMass Amherst to ensure the funding for the MTTC was included in the bill. In addition, over a dozen leading business, high tech, academic and investment groups formally endorsed the legislation and helped to ensure its inclusion. The Governor signed the bill at a State House ceremony on August 13th. Click here for the full text version of the bill.
MTTC "Catalyst Awards"
Working with the Mass Clean Energy Center, the MTTC announced five new awards of $40,000 each which will be awarded to researchers and very early stage companies to prove their clean energy technology.
 | | Brian Neltner, Ph.D., Navolta |
Among the winners is Navolta (formerly MicroReactor Solutions), which is developing unique conductive materials that will reduce the expense of manufacturing solar cells by reducing the need for silver paste. This Catalyst grant will be used to take these conductive materials, incorporate them into samples, get them into the hands of manufacturers for evaluation, and begin the process of scaling up to pilot plant production scales. The company's core technology was licensed technology from UMass Amherst, and the company also has an STTR award with UMass Amherst.
Past awardees of Catalyst Grants have now raised over $22 million in new funding. The MTTC will be working with the MassCEC to obtain funding to continue the program in FY2015.
Mentoring Support
The MTTC has continued to work with UMass Amherst and other campuses on the development of mentoring programs. Mentors and Ventures Program (MVP) held an event that showcased four early stage start-ups to a group of alumni mentors. The program, recently held at the UMass Club, attracted a strong group of mentors who met with each company and provided them strategic advice.
Platforms
The MTTC continues to regularly hold Platform meetings to support early stage companies, introduce them to potential resources and help them with strategic issues.
Conferences and Events
The MTTC held its 7th Mass Life Sciences Innovation Day at the Harvard Club in Boston on June 3. Mark Levin from Third Rock was the opening plenary speaker and focused on the founding of Voyager Therapeutics which has licensed technology from UMass Medical School. A sizable delegation from UMMS (6 people) attended and one poster by Fatemeh Momen-Heravi, Postdoctoral Associate, Department of Medicine was presented.
The MTTC in collaboration with Doug Banks in Economic Development are working with the Senate President's Office on the 3rd US-EU eHealth conference that will be held in October. The MTTC will recruit several early stage companies to present at the conference.
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Thank you to the UMass CVIP staff on each campus as well as Abi Barrow (Director, MTTC), and Michele Bernier (Grant Manager) from the President's Office. If you have any suggestions for a newsletter topic or questions regarding the articles mentioned above, please contact Michele Bernier at mbernier@umassp.edu or me at wrosenberg@umassp.edu.
Sincerely,
William Rosenberg Commercial Ventures & Intellectual Property |
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